Billy Graham Center Archives

Papers of Mrs. Helen Margaret Jaderquist Tenney - Collection 44

[Note: What follows is a description of the documents in this collection which are available for use at BGC Archives in Wheaton, Illinois, USA. The actual documents are not, in most cases, available online, only this description of them. Nor are they available for sale or rent.]

Correspondence, scrapbook, drafts, articles, and research notes which reflect Tenney's active participation in a number of evangelical ministries, but particularly her work with the Woman's Union Missionary Society (WUMS), especially the labor she put into writing a history of that organization. The bulk of the collection consists of manuscripts of that history.

Helen Margaret was born to Rev. John E. and Mary Olsen Jaderquist July 22, 1904 in Buffalo, New
York. Her father, a Christian and Missionary Alliance pastor, served as a pastor, teacher,
denominational executive, director of publications for the CMA, and on the board as representative
for several foreign mission boards. Helen had one sister, Mary Elizabeth (born 1906) who married
W. Wallace Padden. She graduated from Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois in 1925 with a B.A.
in history, from Northwestern University in 1928 with a M.A. in history and from Gordon College
in Massachusetts in 1928 with a B.D. Helen taught at Northfield Seminary in Massachusetts from
1928 until her marriage in 1930 to Merrill C. Tenney.

After their marriage the Tenneys moved to Wenham, where he was a professor at Gordon College.
In 1943, when he became a professor at Wheaton College, the family moved to Wheaton, Illinois.

Helen served on the board of Women's Union Missionary Society (WUMS) and was active in its
work as was her sister who served as president of the society for over ten years. She authored a
history of the WUMS which is included in this collection. She also wrote Mark's Sketchbook of
Christ (1956), several magazine articles and Sunday school materials and served as an officer of the
Woman's Fellowship of the National Association of Evangelicals. After a long illness, Mrs. Tenney
died January 22, 1978.

Scope and Content

The contents of this collection to a small degree illustrate Mrs. Tenney's active participation as an
officer in a number of evangelical ministries but mostly the files document her work in the
W.U.M.S. and especially the labor she put into her history of that organization, No Higher Honor.

Well over two thirds of the collection consists of various drafts of different parts of the book.
Folders 2-3 thru 2-15 contain successive versions of the preface, most chapters, and the appendix
(which lists the names of missionaries sent out by W.U.M.S. and some details of their service).
Folders 1-13, 1-14, 2-1, and 2-2 contain almost complete drafts of the book at various stages of its
development. The manuscript in folder 1-13 is probably the book in its final form except for some
missing pages. Other parts of the collection contain the raw material from which Mrs. Tenney
constructed the book. Boxes 3 and 4 contain hundreds of her research notes. These notes are
arranged in their original order and condition, except that where paper clips and rubber bands had
been used to separate them into groups, blank card guides have been substituted. Folder 2-16
contains documents or copies of documents she consulted such as wills; papers by Sarah D.
Doremus, one of the founders of the W.U.M.S., in which she gives details of the early days of the
organization and describes a world tour she took of its mission in the years 1901-1902; a brief
history written in 1911 of the Society's work in Japan; a very interesting account by missionary
Pollock of life in a Japanese internment camp during World War II; an article about Elizabeth
Pollock; an account of the beginning of the Multan Hospital in India; and a very early document
outlining the goals of the W.U.M.S. and several endorsements the work had received. Other folders
also hold apparent sources such as annual reports, newspaper clippings, and pamphlets put out by
the Society describing its work.

There are six files that deal with non-W.U.M.S. matters. File 1-1 contains correspondence with
friends of Mrs. Tenney, although here too some of the information in the letters was intended for her
book or for an article on W.U.M.S., such as a 1969 letter by a woman missionary describing life in
a Japanese internment camp. Folders 1-2 and 1-4 contain copies of reports handed out at a mission
executives meeting in 1965 and 1968 describing various aspects of world wide mission activities.
Mrs. Tenney's work in the Women's Fellowship of the National Association of Evangelicals is amply
documented by numerous copies of minutes of committee meetings, balance sheets, and annual
reports. The reports and minutes also describe many of the projects the Fellowship was involved in,
such as prayer days, Bible classes, support for missionaries and humanitarian relief, and work for
anti-pornography legislation (folders 1-6 to 1-11). Folder 1-5 contains an interesting 1945 booklet
entitled Through Shining Archway published by the American Baptist Foreign Missionary Society
and the Women's American Baptist Foreign Missionary Society. It describes the careers and
martyrdoms of eleven missionaries stationed in the Philippines in 1942. Pictures of the martyrs are
included in the booklet.

The collection also includes pamphlets, manuscripts, papers and a scrapbook. Included in Folder
5-1 is a 20th anniversary booklet, 1921-1941, for the Shanghai Union School of Nursing of Margaret
Williamson Hospital, as well as a Founder's Day publication for the same hospital. There is one
copy of The Sunday School Times, September 17, 1960. A centenary booklet commemorates Mary
A. Merriman School, 1880-1980. Miscellaneous re-writes of chapter of No Higher Honor are
contained Folder 5-2. A complete manuscript of the supplement to Mrs. Tenney's history, covering
the subsequent years 1960-1980, is in Folder 5-3. Newspaper clippings of World Day of Prayer in
Wheaton, Illinois, between 1932 and 1949 are in a scrapbook in Folder 6-1. Folder 6-2 contains
miscellaneous papers, including a history of the Yokohama Church , 1932, and a movingly-written
description of the accidental death of Marion Childress in India in 1963.

Provenance

The materials for this collection were received by the Center in April and June of 1978, and April
of 1979, 1980, and 1981 from Dr. Merrill Tenney. Additional materials were given to the Center
in 1981 by W. Wallace Paddon.